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2009-11-21

2009-11-18

2009-11-05

Agriculture

Lifestyles

Wednesday, June 24, 2009 12:30 PM

BROWN: My stories, for her future

By LINDA BROWN, Hold Me Up A Little Longer, Lord

I read somewhere recently that us older folks should start writing down things from our past — stories that are starting to go by the wayside, if they already haven’t slipped away completely.

The idea is kind of like mini-history books about the things we’ve done, or not, that we’ll leave behind for our grandchildren. They say it gives our young loved ones a better sense of their roots.

I thought it sounded like a fine idea ... until I actually put a pencil to the project. Then I started sounding awfully old and not very sophisticated.

Dear granddaughter Bella,

Although you’re not due to be born for another six weeks, I’ve decided to start recording some trivia for you. Your mama and daddy can give you all the family lineage information as you ask. These are just little information-bites between you and me.

I came home from the hospital at your age wearing a cloth diaper and rubber pants. My mom, your great-grandmother, held me in her arms in the front seat of the car. I don’t know if child-safety seats were invented yet ... if so, we couldn’t afford one.

And, about those cloth diapers: My mama laundered them in a wringer washer in the basement of our house. We didn’t have a clothes dryer, so when it was too cold to dry clothes on the clothesline outside, she strung them on an indoor clothesline.

I drank from a glass baby bottle. The milk was heated in a pan of water on the stove.

Oh, I forgot: The night I was born, the hospital we were at was set on fire by the Kansas City mafia trying to cover up an earlier shooting.

We only had one television, and the screen was really small. I didn’t have a telephone in my bedroom until I had my own house.

I didn’t have a cell phone until 2001. My first e-mail and Internet experiences were in 1997.

The only time I ate in a restaurant was one Saturday afternoon a month when my grandma took me to The Copper Kettle in downtown Kansas City, Kan. We did that from the time I was 5 until I was 10. Grandma was crippled by arthritis by then and was unable to walk or drive.

I didn’t eat in another restaurant until I was in junior high school (you call it middle school now). Sometimes when my friends and I were walking home we’d stop and get a hamburger and fries at Smaks. It was my favorite place to eat.

Other than that, aside from school lunches, we ate our meals at home and a lot of that food my mom had canned from our garden during the summer. I learned to kill and pluck a chicken before I was 10.

I got my first pair of blue jeans when I was 12.

My mom made all my clothes at home with a sewing machine, even my prom and homecoming dresses. When she finally took a job outside our home, she designed baby clothes for Wee Winnie Wearables, a local manufacturer with a nationwide following.

We had one car, which my dad drove to work.

In the summer I drank from the garden hose when I was outside. I loved to play with paper dolls, hop-scotch, jump rope and ride my bike.

I watched on TV when man first walked on the moon, remember exactly where I was when President Kennedy was assassinated and remember pulling over to the side of the road to cry when I heard on the radio that Elvis had died.

I didn’t own a Coach handbag until the year I turned 57. I didn’t own a carat’s worth of diamonds until I was 54.

I didn’t go to kindergarten.

I know it must sound positively barbaric to you, but it’s not been so bad.

I’ve had the same best friend for nearly 50 years.

I have three wonderful children who respect and love me.

I have a husband who adores me and believes I am his greatest treasure.

I have a career many people envy. Not everyone loves going to work every day; I do.

And soon, I’ll have you.

I love you, Bella Marie.

— Grandma B

Linda Brown is marketing director for The Ottawa Herald. E-mail her at lbrown@ottawaherald.com.